Lecture on Colonial Latin American History and Social History of Medicines

CGS Brown Bag Series

Apr 23, 2014
01:30 PM to
02:30 PM

124 Sparks

Rebekah Martin, Penn State

Love magic was a vital part of the everyday experience of disease and healing in colonial Yucatán. Maya, Afro-Yucatecan, and Spanish healers throughout the colonial period used an array of potions, powders, and other ingestibles not only to heal the sick, but also to help colonial Yucatecans attract the amorous attentions of the opposite sex. This lecture explores the variety of medicines and ingested materials used in healing and love magic by colonial Yucatecans, paying particular attention to the preparation and consumption of plant and animal materials in the practice of love magic.

Rebekah Martin is a doctoral student in the Department of History at Penn State, specializing in Colonial Latin American history. Her research focuses on the social history of medicine in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Yucatán with a special interest in Maya and Afro-Mexican healing.

This lecture is a part of the Center for Global Studies Brown Bag Graduate Lecture Series which focuses on interdisciplinary graduate research. It is free and open to the public.

The Center for Global Studies

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